Malin put the sample in the plastic vial and stored it in a belt pouch. She was tempted to look through the hole in the big rock, but something told her that leaving as soon as possible and keeping her curiosity to herself, ultimately, would be for the better.
“Well, our work’s done,” she said.
“One moment please,” Anderson stopped her. “Please, get closer to the Ita-Hu. I want to see what’s inside.”
Malin and Adam shared glances; they knew that would happen.
At the camp, Luciano looked at the indicators on the console board and took the microphone.
“If you’re afraid that the Ita-Hu released toxins when it opened, you can relax,” he said. “The readings we receive from the censors of your suits do not indicate threats.”
“Are you sure?” Malin asked and looked at Adam, who was expecting her to tell him what to do.
“You can see the data on your wrists,” Green replied.
The indicators on the bracelets, between numbers and parameters, did not show danger.
“This detects known toxins,” Adam said. “What about the unknown ones?”
“As long as you wear the suits, there’s nothing to be afraid of,” Green assured.
If those words had come out of Halstein’s mouth, Malin would have questioned them. However, the young biologist gave her a little more confidence. Likewise, and only by stubbornness, she was reluctant to abide by the request without presenting resistance.
“If it is a geode, what else could there be but crystals?”
“It’s just to make sure it’s a giant geode and not something else.” This time, the answer came from David Anderson.
Then, there was a rattle: someone had taken the microphone from the scientist’s hands; Halstein, for sure.
“Do it,” the District Chief ordered.
Adam and Malin shared one last look and spread the palms of their hands to check the status of the force field. After all, it was invisible, and neither of them knew for sure if the Photia had penetrated it, causing a temporary rift in it, or if it had completely disintegrated it.
Nothing. Their hands touched the rock itself; and even with gloves, they perceived the warmth of its surface.
“The electromagnetic shield has vanished,” Green announced.
“Dr. Gabor was right,” Anderson said, and Adam bit his lip upon hearing it.
Malin slid her hands around several places until she was certain that the field had indeed disappeared. Then she met with Adam, and after checking on their wrists’ devices that there was no danger, they peeked into the open hole in the Ita-Hu.
It was impossible to see what was inside. The morning light, diffused through the fabric of the dome, licked the edge of the rock’s external face and part of the crystals that were attached to its internal face, but a little further in, everything turned dark. Adam and Malin moved out of the way so they wouldn’t cast a shadow, but they had no luck with that either.
“Press the button on the side of your bracelets, and the lights on the masks will switch on,” Anderson said, and he let out a sigh of annoyance Malin knew was meant for her as if to say, ‘See? That’s why I should have gone with Mr. White.’
Adam and Malin pressed the button. None of the tiny lamps the masks had on their edges emitted the light that promised to sweep the shadows. The squeak of a short circuit, that was it.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
On the console board, Luciano Green observed the state of the suits’ lighting system.
The lamp filaments burned out upon their switches got activated, possibly due to static overload. Perhaps the electromagnetic remnants of the force field or the energy expelled by Mr. White had been more powerful than they expected, and the tiny fuses, which were far weaker than those of the oxygenation system, hadn’t been able to withstand it.
“In Homam Enterprises, we manufacture good quality lamps,” Adam mocked them. “I can offer you guys a discount if you’re interested.”
Malin knew that a technical failure wouldn’t stop the scientists’ curiosity and that they would insist until one of them poked their noses in the bowels of the Ita-Hu, so she came up with a way to light up the darkness. She contracted her fingers twice, letting the electric current course through her fingers, and formed a Photia in the palm of her hand.
“What are you doing?” Adam asked.
“Maybe my Photia in this environment doesn’t have the capacity for destruction, but…” Malin put her hand into the hole and used the ball of energy as a torch to push back the darkness.
She poked her face out of the jaws of the rock, and the majesty she found within captivated her.
Thousands of twinned crystals covered the inner side of the rock, with rhomboid shapes and pointed edges that crisscrossed one another, forming countless faces that shone as if they were glossy mirrors. They were the Ita-Hu’s teeth. And in its center, crystals clumped together, forming some kind of giant stone fruit. The rock was not a simple shell. After an empty spot, it also hid an enormous heart.
Malin looked at the base of that crystalline mass and discovered something opaque that didn’t glow like the rest. She put her face through the opening to see better what it was about and discovered—puzzled, and at the same time, surprised—what caused that difference in brightness and textures.
“Halstein, you see this?” she asked.
The District Chief, Anderson, and Green focused on the monitor that was transmitting what she was seeing. The other scientists who worked in the tent dropped their duties and came closer to see what was happening.
Anderson’s graying brows rose into two perfect arches, and his already bulging eyes were about to pop out of their sockets.
“That is…” he said, and what began as a statement ended as a question; “…Tar?”
“If the tar were purple, then yes,” Malin said.
If the orifice where she had poked her head was the Ita-Hu’s mouth, and the crystals, the teeth, then this new find was the saliva or, even worse, the blood. Malin felt chills just thinking about it.
But what else could that thick violet liquid that rested down there between the crystals be? Anderson might have nailed it; maybe it was tar. Maybe it could be oil. Perhaps there was a modest oil endowment under the jungle, which had reached the black egg through an underground canal connected to the depths of the ground.
No. The oil was black, not purple. This substance rather looked like the Ita-Hu’s inner mineral, that kind of amethyst, but in a liquid state.
Malin regretted that the mask that defended her from possible toxins also nullified her sense of smell; otherwise, she might have defined what was within a few inches of her hand; in case that thing had a smell, that is.
Don’t take off your mask now, dear, she warned herself. And don’t even think about touching that.
The graphic indicators on her bracelet did not warn of any danger. But a puncture pierced her wrist, and with a groan, she closed her hand and her Photia disappeared.
“What’s wrong?” Adam worried.
“Nothing.” Malin withdrew her hand from inside the rock and rubbed her wrist. “The implant,” she said and made a reassuring gesture. “I just felt a shock in the trigger implant.” She tensed her fingers twice again, and a slight shock vibrated the tendons in her wrist, but she managed to activate the implant and the light of the discharges reappeared in the palm of her hand. “The electrostatic charge inside the rock must be quite high.”
“Let me try,” Adam said, and Malin stepped aside.
Adam formed his own sphere of energy and fire and mimicked his partner’s procedure to study what was inside. He looked at the twinned crystals and that huge heart made of shiny stones, and then, he noticed the dark goo which, following the name given by Anderson and without giving it too much thought, he called tar. It didn’t occur to him to think of that slimy pool as Ita-Hu’s blood. He did think, though, that it could be the rock’s inner minerals in a liquid state, or the remnants of a deposit, not necessarily oil, covered by the rock. The purplish color meant little to him until Anderson said, “It’s amethyst… but liquid.”
“That’s what I thought,” Malin said.
“Is that even a thing or you guys just made that up? To me, it’s purple tar,” Adam said, and wanting the light of his Photia to give them a more accurate idea of the nature of that opaque substance, he put his hand close to it.
Wisps of energy from his flaming ball licked at the thick puddle, and what happened next scared the living hell out of him.
In the camp, surprise struck the scientists, who were now watching the transmission through Adam’s camera.
Some were dead silent, others gasped with amazement.